Update
It’s been several weeks since a new post here at the Conlanging Librarian blog. Not that anyone is that concerned but, as way of explanation, the primary reason was some wonky home Internet access (either intermittent or non-existent). It’s amazing how reliant one becomes on having reliable Internet access. The problem appears to be resolved now. (Insert sigh of relief here.)
Although I haven’t been able to post, I have been busy (both life-wise and conlang-wise). It’s not necessary to discuss the life-wise points here; but a brief mention of the conlang-wise points seems appropriate. I’ve been working on a new primer of Dritok built around telling a story of a Drushek teaching a Tylnor how to speak the language. The book(let) isn’t ready for primetime quite yet, but stay tuned. I’m rather pleased with it so far. This personal project stems most recently from a discussion on CONLANG-L, but it all started with my being impressed with Carsten Becker’s original primer of Ayeri years ago.
I’ve also been reading several books on language which I plan on posting some conlang-related reviews of in the near future including one on Pirahã.
Finally, I’ve been in preliminary discussions with some other conlangers about the formation of a conlang-related Wikipedia “task force.” This might be similar to something like what we have in library-land called Slam the Boards, a monthly event where librarians answer questions on the online answer boards and specifically say “a librarian helped answer this question.” The basic idea of the Conlang Wikipedia Project (or whatever it ends up being called) would pick one day of the month (Maybe the 17th of each month?) and conlangers (or other language experts) would choose a Wikipedia article to edit, add to, revise, or otherwise enhance. Specific articles that needed work could be highlighted beforehand on the web somewhere. This would also not simply target the English-language Wikipedia, but also other languages as well like this, this, and this. Stay tuned for more information on this project and its logistics, and feel free to comment on this idea as a reply to this blog posting.
Fiat lingua!
Hallowe’en Cthulhu
This post isn’t necessarily conlang related (but we’re going to make it so). First, my son found Cthulhu in a book of monsters quite some time ago and decided that was what he wanted to be for Hallowe’en this year. At the right is the result of our collaboration. He didn’t think anyone would know who he was…but we did have two teenage trick-or-treaters say “Run away from Cthulhu!” tonight. The slides can be viewed full-screen by clicking in the lower right corner of the slideshow after it starts.
In keeping with the conlang focus of this blog, let’s construct a sentence. Referring back to my theory on R’lyehese: Cthulhu wgah’nagl! or “Cthulhu in his abode”.
Happy Hallowe’en!
Through the Language Glass: A Conlanger’s Perspective
Through the Language Glass: Why the World Looks Different in Other Languages, the most recent book by Guy Deutscher, is a thought-provoking, highly-readable romp through some of the more unexpected realms of language. Deutscher is more than happy to take on with relish those ideas considered orthodox or “common sense” and to defend his own views, backing them up with facts and research. A number of very positive reviews of Through the Language Glass can be found online (such as here, here, and here, just to note a few), but what does the work have to offer conlangers? Being primarily an artlanger, I apologize ahead of time if this review strays too far in that direction. Deutscher’s book examines three main areas in-depth: color terms, grammatical gender, and spatial orientation. Let’s look at each of these in turn.
First, we examine color terminology. Deutscher examines how different languages split up the spectrum, and it turns out that my *blue* may not necessarily be your *blue*. In explaining the history of color terms, the author reaches back to W. E. Gladstone’s Studies on Homer and the Homeric Age, Volume 3, and its section entitled Homer’s Perception and Use of Colour and continues all the way up to the World Color Survey. The idea of slicing up the WCS-Munsell Color Chart or the CIE Color Space in novel ways to highlight the alien-ness or foreign-ness of a conlang’s speakers appeals to me. As Deutscher points out clearly, there are a number of interesting variations on the theme of how colors are designated in the world of natural languages. Even a language as familiar as Russian has "синий" and "голубой" whereas English simply has "blue". Granted, we English-speakers have shades of blue (light, dark, navy, baby, sky, etc.) and blue-related colors (turquoise, azure, indigo, etc.). Is purple a kind of blue? These are all concepts that can be played with in a conlang.
Next, let’s look at grammatical gender. Personally, I think this is a largely untapped field for conlangs to play in. Some of the African and Australian gender systems are very tempting to riff on. Deutscher talks about the “Bantu languages such as Swahili [which] have up to ten genders, and the Australian language Ngan’gityemerri is said to have fifteen different genders.” Of the 319 languages which specify use of grammatical gender in the Conlang Atlas of Language Structure database, over half (175 or 54.8%) use no gender at all. More interestingly, 84 conlangs use the familiar sex-based gender system and only 60 are non-sex-based. Another thing to consider is that it might be fun to determine how gender is assigned to words in one’s lexicon. One of my favorite stories related by Deutscher (in both Through the Language Glass as well as The Unfolding of Language) is how the Gurr-goni word "erriplen" (English "airplane") ended up in the vegetable gender category. It makes perfect sense when the history is known (or surmised), but, on first glance it makes no sense at all. Of course, if one is attempting to streamline or simplify language, gender is probably first on the list of things to excise. Alternatively, a conlang that attempts to be akin to natural languages would be more than likely to have grammatical gender. Why not have fun with it?
Finally, what about spatial orientation? This is the area that made the most impact on me. I really want to come up with a novel (or one that at least doesn’t have too many ANADEWisms) orientation system now. Deutscher provides several excellent alternatives to simple left-right-front-back. One is Guugu Yimithirr which uses an east-west-north-south system all the time. Another is Tzeltal (a Mayan language) which uses a downhill-uphill-across (in the direction of X). On the Marquesas Islands in French Polynesia, one finds mountainward-seaward-east-west. Depending on the geographical location of one’s conlang-speakers, I can see these or other systems being a lot of fun to create. Is there a specific location of historical/spiritual/geographical significance to your speakers? Orient towards that. This would also have some interesting connotations within a story as well (as well as lots of opportunity for misunderstandings… which could be a positive plot device).
These are just a few of the highlights in Deutscher’s new book. His The Unfolding of Language is one of my favorite narrative nonfiction books on language. (Arika Okrent‘s is, of course, another.) His new one is well worth the read, and has some great quotes, intriguing points, and enjoyable prose. Whether you buy it, check it out from your local library, or borrow it from a friend, make sure to put it on your conlang reading list.
Explorations in the Library
After the mind-numbing tedium of sorting out the situation shared in my last post, I felt I needed something more uplifting. And so…
Over the last couple months, I’ve had the opportunity (as part of my day job) to visit the libraries at Kent State University (KSU) and The Ohio State University (OSU). Having some free time available before or after my official duties were completed, I decided to visit the PM8001 to PM9021 areas of the Library of Congress Classifications hanging out on the open shelves. For those less-versed in bibliographical arcana, those are the areas dedicated to artificial, universal, picture, and secret languages. I was curious what would be represented in my favorite subject on the open stacks of the two universities.
KSU had only a couple shelves dedicated to the PM8001 to PM9021’s; however, it was not all dedicated to what one would expect. What I expected was a lot of Esperanto, which I got; however, they also had several more esoteric volumes sitting there waiting for the eager conlanger to pick them up. These included a facscimile copy of Francis Lodowyck’s Common Writing from 1647 (PM8008 .L59 1969).
One surprise at KSU was a little volume entitled Enterprises of great pith and moment : a proposal for a universal second language by Elmer Joseph Hankes (PM8008 .H34). Published in 1982, the subtitle of the work named this “universal second language” Em Sigh Ay or the “language called please or Polite Language”. The book is “dedicated to the promotion of politeness and consideration in all of our relationships with each other.” I did not have the time to see how this high-minded goal was carried out in detail. For those interested, the title of the work comes from Hamlet, Act III, Scene 1:
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry
And lose the name of action.
Yesterday’s visit to OSU turned up many more volumes residing in the latter PM’s on the open shelf. This is to be expected, as OSU is one of the major universities in the country. Even so, they fit on about one-and-a-half shelving units total. They had the requisite volumes on Esperanto, David Salo’s Gateway to Sindarin, and some other fairly-well-known languages. Some surprises, to me at least, were aUI: the language of space; for the first time represented and adapted to the needs of this planet by John W. Weilgart with illustrations by Elisabeth Söderberg (PM8008 .W4). This was published in 1968 by Cosmic Communication Company. Another surprise was The complete dictionary of Guosa language: 106,962 head words from traditional Nigerian and West African languages : a 20th century evolution by Alex Ekhaguosa Igbineweka (PM8368.Z5 I359 2007). It appears that Igbineweka also has a website with video on his proposed Nigerian and West African lingua franca. Finally, there was also A Moroccan Arabic Secret Language : the x…xinCa family by Nasser Berjaoui (PM9001 .B47 2007). I’m not quite sure if the language described by Berjaoui is a conlang or not, but it certainly is in the right LCC area. In any case, it was very interesting to see languages from Africa represented on the shelf.
While these titles were new to me, I have subsequently seen some of them listed in both Arika Okrent’s list and Rick Harrison’s comprehensive bibliography. Just goes to show, no matter how much you think you know about invented languages, there’s always more to learn.
Fiat lingua!
Hacked!
Today, I unfortunately had both my Gmail and Yahoo hacked. If you received an email from me saying that I was stranded in the UK, I apologize for the inconvenience…even though I really had nothing to do with it. Anyway, you get the idea. It’s been highly, excruciatingly inconvenient but it doesn’t appear (as of right now) that anything major was compromised. Still working through the Google mess. As a matter of fact, I’m writing this post just to re-assure myself that the blog still works.
One rather unexpected silver lining was that I actually got an email in my work Inbox from one of our prominent conlang community members living in Europe asking where I was and if he could help. I emailed (from that account) to let him know I was still in the US and had been hacked. He was somewhat amused at the creative lengths to which these people will go to get money and also wished me luck in resolving this. I was impressed that he took the time to contact me. Not only are conlangers erudite, but, gosh darn it, if they aren’t awfully nice people, too.
Thanks for listening, and don’t forget to keep those passwords, et al., battened down.
New Conlanging Book!
Israel Noletto has published a new book examining the world of constructed languages entitled Glossopoese – O Complexo e Desconhecido Mundo das LÃnguas Artificiais. As you might guess from the title, the book is written in Portuguese, Noletto’s first language. He has graciously supplied The Conlanging Librarian with an English translation of the book’s description:
Many have probably already seen, heard or read something about languages like Esperanto, Quenya and Sindarin. Maybe some have seen films or read pieces of literature full of exemplars of the artificial languages. Yet, when people hear anything related to this, they frequently react out of total surprise, and ask questions like: That language was invented by an individual, how so? Is it a mixture of other languages? Is it a code? In Glossopoesis – The Complex and Unknown World of the Artificial Languages, the author researches the available literature and the various communities throughout the world and the Internet. As a result, the answers to the forementioned questions have been found, and a new scientific perspective on the Glossopoesis has been developed.
When asked if he plans an English translation of Glossopoese, Noletto replied “I definitely plan on translating my book into English, although I don’t see it happening any time soon, since I’m already involved in a number of other conlanging related researches to make our secret vice more well-known and scientifically respected in my own language right now.” An extremely admirable goal! Glossopoese definitely has the potential to spread the word to the Portuguese-speaking world about the art and science of language creation. In the meantime, Noletto’s important new work should spur those English-speakers with an interest in conlanging to brush up on their Portuguese.
Israel Noletto is well-qualified to pen a book on conlanging. On January 26, 2009, he was the first person to host a “conlang event” in the Brazilian state of PiauÃ. Actually, this was his final essay defense for his degree in “‘Letras/Inglês’, a University course focused on the English Language and Literature.” (Click here for his posting in Portuguese.) It would also appear that conlanging runs in his family. (Click here for a rough English Google translation of that page.)
So, Parabéns! on publishing the book and Obrigado! for the efforts on behalf of conlanging. (Note: I’m hoping those mean “Congratulations!” and “Thank you!” respectively. I had to look them up online.)
A Holiday for Conlangers
St. Hildegard von Bingen's Litterare Ignotae
The Irish (and those who want to be Irish) have St. Patrick‘s Day on March 17. The romantic have (St.) Valentine‘s Day on February 14. Both of these well-known holidays – now very secular – started out (and remain) the feast or memorial days of these two saints. (Check out Butler’s Lives of the Saints). If only conlangers had a holiday like these…
Right now, Esperanto enthusiasts have their Zamenhofa Tago. Klingon-speakers have their qepmey. And, of course, there are the Language Creation Conferences (which are lots of fun but also like work for organizers and presenters).
…but wait, conlangers do have their own unofficial saint – Hildegard von Bingen. Hildegard was also known as the Sibyl of the Rhine and would have been an incredible woman in any age, let alone the 12th century. One of the best print resources concerning Hildegard is Dr. Sarah Higley’s Hildegard of Bingen’s Unknown Language: An Edition, Translation, and Discussion. Hildegard’s feast day is commemorated each September 17.
So, my proposal is that we, as conlangers, celebrate the art, craft, and science of language construction each September 17. It would be an ecumenical holiday, able to be celebrated by conlangers of all kinds: artlangers, auxlangers, and engelangers.
First, there are several ways one could refer to the holiday. The full St. Hildegard’s Day, simply Hildegard’s Day, the abbreviated St. Hilde’s Day, or, if you like, Hildefest. My personal preference is St. Hilde’s Day. For me, it just falls more trippingly off the tongue. But that’s just me.
What are some St. Hilde’s Day greetings? St. Patrick’s Day has Erin go bragh! Christmas has the traditional “merry”. New Year’s has “happy.” Well, there’s always words from Hildegard’s Lingua Ignota like chorzta “sparkling”. Maybe someone who knows the vocabulary of Lingua Ignota could chime in. For the time being: “Happy Hilde’s Day!”.
How would one celebrate St. Hilde’s Day? That’s up to the community of conlangers. I posted something about this on both Twitter and CONLANG-L. Some suggestions include coffee (or tea) and grammar, finishing up a languishing conlang project (or starting a new one), composing conlang music or poetry (St. Hildegard did both!), buying a conlang/linguistics book you’ve been putting off, etc. There was also the first Concultural Card Exchange this past holiday season. What about exchanging these kinds of cards on September 17? What about choosing this date to share a conlanging program at your local library or writers’ circle. The possibilities are numerous. And Hildegard was German…so that means beer, right?
One comment from the illustrious David Peterson is absolutely priceless and has to be shared: “Shouldn’t we participate in rampant commercialism somehow, so that in years to come, we can say, ‘St. Hildegard’s Day used to be about the conlanging!'” 🙂
So, there’s my proposal. When September 17, 2011, rolls around, how will you celebrate St. Hilde’s Day?
ámman îar
As many of you may be aware, David J. Peterson has posthumously awarded his annual ~:D Smiley Award to David Bell’s Tolkien-inspired conlang ámman îar. Being that we just commemorated the anniversary of Prof. Tolkien’s death, it seemed appropriate on this blog to also highlight the work of David Bell.
I had been dimly aware of ámman îar for some time, but the Smiley Award got me to take another look at it. Evidently, previous looks were cursory at best. I had no idea of the depth of detail that had been included. One page that caught my eye this time was the script which David Bell created for his language. Many conlangers are familiar with Tengwar clones. Bell’s is definitely not a clone but rather a well-thought-out evolution of the scripts of Middle-earth into a cursive form. At first glance, his tal-eglar looks like cursive letters in any Roman-script alphabet. However, on closer inspection, they are firmly based in the tradition of the script of Feanor.
The Smiley Award write-up does a great job of highlighting some of the finer points of Bell’s creation, but to truly appreciate it, one needs to delve deeply into his web site, now preserved at graywizard.conlang.org. You will not be disappointed.
(For past Smiley Award winners, click here)
Namárië, JRRT
Today is the anniversary of the death in 1973 of JRR Tolkien, arguably the Shakespeare of constructed languages. Although my personal penchant for playing with language (okay, that’s more than a sufficient amount of alliteration) dates back even to Dr. Seuss’s On Beyond Zebra in elementary school, Tolkien was a HUGE influence on my early conlanging efforts and beyond. My personal constructed world owes a lot (in its early incarnations) to Middle-earth. I enjoyed The Lord of the Rings, but I think my favorite parts were the Appendices. It was the background that Tolkien felt compelled to create that really sparked my imagination and set me down the path of language creation.
Furthermore, “A Secret Vice” is still instructive and remains a pivotal, eloquent document in the line of apologetics for our craft which has continued with David J. Peterson’s The Conlang Manifesto and Boudewijn Rempt’s Apologia pro Imaginatione to name only two.
So, thank you, Professor Tolkien, for your inspiration.
Nan úye sére indo-ninya sÃmen, ullume; ten sà ye tyelma, yéva tyel ar i narqelion, Ãre ilqa yéva nótina… (from Firiel’s Song)
(Note: The photo at left is one of my most enduring images of JRRT. It was the one on the back cover of the first edition of The Lord of the Rings that I ever bought.)
Worlds Collide
I had the oddest experience today. I work at a large metropolitan library and was walking down the hall today when a patron saw me and said, “Saluton! I was reading about you in a book today.” This particular patron was vaguely familiar, but I hadn’t really had the opportunity to speak with him for a couple years. Not since I worked in a different department. Well, my brain started spinning, and I finally asked, “Do you mean Arika Okrent’s In the Land of Invented Languages? He said, “Yeah. Can you say hello in your chipmunk language?” Unfortunately, I’ve been away from Drytok for a while, so I couldn’t oblige him…the shock of being asked to speak it out-of-the-blue notwithstanding. We talked for a while; I told him about Arika’s new book I heard she was working on, and I encouraged him to check out the posting at the Language Creation Society page of the actual LCC presentation of Drytok’s first public appearance. All in all, a great way to brighten up a Monday! 🙂